Monday, June 05, 2006

Anatolians are leaners. That is, when they are comfortable or being affectionate with someone, one of the ways they express this happy mood is to lean against that person. :D

Of course, when the person is sturdy, not caught by surprise and can handle it, it's such a sweet thing to observe.

Here are two photos of Zor (mother of Ruya) leaning against or about to lean against James.

Zor with a expression of sweet affection and concentration, catching her just as she is about to flop over (TIMBERRRRRR!!!) against James. That's Boone on the ground leaning his head on James' boots.

Zor leaning on James as he talks to me from the doorway. The glow in her eyes is from the camera flash rather than a very probable psychedelic high she seems to get from this leaning behavior...

Ah, that wonderful togetherness factor :)

Lean on me when you're not strongAnd I'll be your friendI'll help you carry onFor it won't be longTill I'm gonna needSomebody to lean on

Lean on me...

A problem with all this affectionate leaning is that Anatolians will also lean on small or frail humans that they adore. This can result in humans flopping over like so many dominoes! And sometimes the Anatolian is so sure you will be there at the moment that they flop over on you, if you do move, they WILL fall over. Now is that like one of those Corporate Team Building Trust exercises or what?

Anatolian Pow-wow

One prevention is get everyone seated, or to have the dog lay down next to the person of their affections, or to sit in front of the person and gently accept attention.

My kind of doggie people are perfectly happy to sit on the ground or on a big blankie with the dogs sprawled around them, but of course, this is not always convenient nor necessarily considered civilized when the ground is yucky and the dogs covered with mud.

Anatolians can be taught to do a gentle handshake and kids really are thrilled with shaking hands with a dog that is as big as they are. Don't encourage pawing (those BIG paws can be a bit MUCH!), but shaking hands on command only.

Aww I love the famous Anatolian lean. Mine do it all the time too. Sometimes if I move away too fast they will almost fall over. Raven presses into you so much that she'll about make you fall over. You gotta love the lean! Great post!